User Anonymous

German Grain Sultana Breads with Treacle

Recently I have had a craving for grains and seeds and have been baking with Australia’s Laucke's German Grain Bread Mix. I am looking into ways to grind my own flour, but before I am settled on a permanent solution, I am happy to bake with pre-mixed grains and seeds flour.

Laucke's bread mixes work well with sourdough baking; you are almost guaranteed success as the flour has been conditioned for performance.It is a bit like cheating and very convenient for the home bakers.Its German Grain Bread Mix has malt, emulsifier, enzyme, and Vitamin C all built in, in addition to 15% grains (kibbled rye, linseed, kibbled maize, and wheat flakes).The only thing that I would be careful about is not to double up the salt quantity as salt has also been added.

Following were two German Grain Sultana Breads with Treacle that I made a few weeks ago, both with 23% sultanas (one with 8% treacle and the other with 12% treacle):

150 g sultanas (rinsed in water and drained, 10 minutes before incorporating into the dough)

360 g water

3 g salt (for the flour portion in the starter)

78 gAustralia’s CSR treacle syrup (12%, for the first bread) or 52 g (8%, for the second bread)

Each dough weighed about 1.3 kg and approx. dough hydration was 75%.The bag suggests a dough hydration of 76.7%, so 10 – 20 grams additional water would be no problem at all.

My treacle was mixed in with the water before being added into the starter, and my sultanas were combined into the dough after its autolyse.Because my starter was high as a percentage of final dough flour, the final dough was fermented shorter time than usual (in the coolish room temperature of 22C about 5 1/2 - 6 hours all-up).

This is a delicious bread.I will be interested in exploring savory ideas with this pre-mixes.